Library Media Center Websites

A Recent survey shows that most schools librarians maintain websites. As the Library technical assistant at my school, my duties include but not limited to maintaining and updating websites, disseminating information, and aiding students and instructors with locating resources and databases. While it can be a hard balance to achieve, creating a well-designed, streamlined and functional website is worth the effort.

Designing the interface of a library media center website can sometimes be the most challenging part (Warlick, 2005). However, it is usually easier to sketch out the design of the site first before developing the interface since it tends to minimize the need to redesign. Moreover, because the school covers a broad range of grades, we have created the homepage with links to specific homepages for different age groups. Colors tend to pose additional problems, and thus they should be selected in a way to ensure both the appeal and readability of the site when designing. See an example of how a particular elementary school utilizes this concept http://villagewiki.pbworks.com/w/page/13226814/FrontPage.

Although media center websites may differ in content, every site should include the mail address of librarian, webmaster contacts, phone number and mailing address of the site. The contact information plays a vital role in allowing the users to get in touch with the librarian for technical assistance. Given these points, I am usually fascinated by websites with a good layout; For instance, I like sites which display different types of information with varying colors and fonts. Nonetheless, it ticks me off to open a website only to find that it contains internal links that are not user-friendly. Internal links are essential parts of a website, and they should connect the user to the relevant pages to enhance their experience. See examples of some elementary schools that provide hostile links http://mediaservices.solon.k12.ia.us/SCSDMediaServices/Site/Lakeview.html and http://www.mtlaurelschools.org/hillside/library/hslibrary.html